There are hills surrounding the city called Flatland but no one there knows of them. Cedar has been living there uncertainly for months now and no one will talk to her; she moves through the city as unregarded and impotent as a ghost. She comes from the hills and the hills do not exist. She came down from the high places with the breath of snow upon her and she does not exist. The people of Flatland see her, but do not see her. She speaks, but they do not hear; touches them but they do not feel her.

There are other strangers living in town, and they are perforce thrown together, an odd collection of tourists, thieves, visionaries and madmen. They gather in the cafés where the baristas leave small cups of coffee or wine at each table for the prophets.

Cedar has been sleeping with two of her fellow ghosts, an older man who came across the mountains years ago, and a young Flatland man who went up into the hills after the moon and came down bright-eyed and deathless in the manner of all ideas. At night they tangle together on the rooftops and the streets, limbs curved around each other, full of the strange beauty of the city called Flatland.